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Manuel Managing Report Card: Game 40, The RISPeckoning

STARTING LINEUP: B-

This lineup featured the best 7 hitters in the lineup in the top 7 spots of the order, 2 of our best 3 hitters in the 1-2-4 spots, and Dan Murphy at first base instead of Jeremy Reed.  Murphy went on to look EXCELLENT in the field.  Which can only lead us to more second-guessing of the Reed experiment in the first place. 

The quibbles I can find with this lineup are as follows:

1) Ramon Castro, who actually hit ahead of someone in the lineup today(!!), should've split up Church and Murphy at 5-6.

2) Going with the best hitters at 1-2-4, I think this iteration of the lineup puts Beltran second, Church 3rd, and Castillo 7th.  Again, a very "safe" manager move to put Castillo second.

Still, compared to the last few games, this was an excellent lineup for Jerry.

BULLPEN MANAGEMENT: B

When you have the highest leverage situation you can possibly get, you want your ace reliever on the mound.  Jerry Manuel did not select his ace reliever.  That said, like I went into last post's comments section, very few teams actually do this at this point.  He did go to his "top setup man", and while Parnell and Stokes are pitching better than Putz is, he was coming off a few pretty good outings in a row where the fastball velocity was back again. 

I'm not ready to strip Putz's setup man role away from him yet, it's still too early in the season and he was pitching sore, if not hurt.  This was a defensible move to me.  No A until you start bringing in K-Rod in these spots.

IN-GAME TACTICS: C+

Not a single bunt all night, in what was a tie game for most of the time?  I'm not disappointed, but I am a little surprised given our speed. 

Honestly, there isn't a whole lot to critique here for most of the game.  The starters were both pitching out of the few jams they got into, with little help from managing.  Nobody attempted a steal asides from Beltran in the first and Pagan in the ninth, both of which were successful and well-played (I'd argue Beltran going to first but his career SB% means I'm going to give him the benefit of the doubt.

The top of the eighth was the most interesting scenario, so lets skip ahead to that.  Wright flew out to center, but it was deep enough to get Beltran and Castillo both to advance, so with second and third and Murphy due, Torre went to his lefty-specialist again.  With no double play opportunity, Jerry elected to let Murphy hit.  Murphy has been a low SO batter, and as I pointed to in yesterday's thread, has pretty nice numbers in a small sample against lefties.  Sheffield and Tatis were both on the bench, and I think I would have gone ahead and PH Sheffield against the lefty.  But, with only one out and the run coming home, getting the ball in play is a big deal.  Sheffield has struck out in 15% of his at-bats this year, compared to Murphy's 7%.  It's close enough to where I'm willing to give the benefit of the doubt to Manuel, again taking into account the need to not try to turn Murphy into a platoon player.  I still would've taken Sheffield, since he gives you the best chance to put 2 runs on the board there and put the game almost out of reach considering how poor the Dodgers hitting was.

Manuel followed this up by pinch-hitting for Church with Tatis, the other right-handed hitter on the bench besides Sheffield.  Here's what I was surprised to learn when I looked it up.  Not only is Tatis hitting poorly against left-handers this year, but for his career, he only has a 13 point OPS split towards left-handers: he's actually completely miscast as a platoon player.  Sheffield, on the other hand, has a 55 point split towards left-handers.  He was also the right solution to the question "who should have hit at some point in the eighth inning?"   I am willing to give Manuel credit here for actually pinch-hitting a right-handed hitter against a left-handedone.  Baby steps, after the last few nights.  But Sheffield needed to be up in the eighth at some point.

In the ninth, after Pagan reached, I also think Sheffield should have been sent up for Reed, given that it was Jonathan Broxton and you need someone who can hit the ball out of the ballpark to beat him.  The thing is, if Manuel had pinch-hit him for Ramon Martinez, the Mets have no shortstop left on the roster.  Even Tatis is gone, so you're talking about using Castillo at short, putting Murphy at second, and putting Sheffield at first.  It might have been the right move, but I don't think there is a manager in the game who'd make that substitution based on the emergency player idea.  So, Sheffield needed to pinch-hit for someone that inning, and it should've been Reed. 

LATE EDIT: According to Surfin The Mets, Manuel said that Sheffield was not available for tonight's game due to illness.  I'm leaving it all up anyway, but consider Jerry absolved of those moves and cross out anoher of Omar Minaya's nine lives instead.  I changed the grade from a C- to a C+ in light of these facts.)

Oh, and that intentional walk to James "84 OPS+" Loney is another one on the intentional walk blooper reel for Manuel.  There is absolutely no reason to be scared of Loney, and since the Mets were already hitting like crap, that means a double takes them from the odds being merely improbably to statistically impossible.

OVERALL: B-

Jerry Manuel can not hit with runners in scoring position, and it's not his fault Ramon Martinez is the only shortstop on the roster that can play a full game.  This was an ugly loss, but I don't think he deserves much of the blame for it, all things considered.

This FanPost was contributed by a member of the community and was not subject to any vetting or approval process. It does not necessarily reflect the opinions, reasoning skills, or attention to grammar and usage rules held by the editors of this site.

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I actually agree with using Tatis to PH

If you were going to PH with Murphy, you go with Sheffield, since Torre already made the pitching change and would have to stick with the lefty. But he had Mota up in the pen, and at the very least, Tatis makes Torre’s decision difficult there, and gives you a better chance is he does go to Mota. Then again, if Sheffield would have guaranteed that Mota got in the game, I’m sure a lot of folks here would have signed up for that.

"All energy flows according to the whims of the great magnet

What a fool I was to defy him"

-HST

by Mark Himmelstein on May 21, 2009 2:42 AM EDT reply actions  

Sign me up for more Mota.

But actually I do have to edit this criticism out since Manuel stated that Sheffield was unavailable tonight.

- Rivers McCown, From Mom's Basement

by riversmccown on May 21, 2009 4:24 AM EDT up reply actions  

With Sheff being out...

I have no problem with anything that he did except leaving Ramon Martinez in to hit against Broxton in the 9th.

I’m not upset with Martinez for not getting a hit, I’m upset that Jerry left one of his players in a situation where he was destined to fail. I know the bench is thin, but even Omir Santos has a better opportunity in that situation to be successfull.

I put Ramon’s chances there against Broxton in about the .050 range. Anything has to be better and the argument about having no one to play SS is a bad one.

You don’t need a SS if the game is over and I think we were all pretty certain that was going to be the case with Ramon up there. A Manager’s job is to put his guys in the best situation to be successful and he left poor Ramon hanging out to dry.

by AnthonyR on May 21, 2009 10:47 AM EDT reply actions  

"Omir Santos has a better opportunity in that situation to be successfull."

Does he? Why, other than because you say so? I mean, nobody is mistaking Martinez for Willie Mays, but he’s got a career MLB OPS of .692. Santos has a career minor league OPS of .650. He’s just not a tremendously good hitter and you could describe him as “destined to fail” in that situation as much so as you could describe Martinez that way, probably more so. And the fact that you pull a number like .050 out of a hat doesn’t make it true. Regardless of what his actual chance of succeeding there was, it was almost certainly better than the chance Santos would have had if he’d been used to PH there.

by JoshNY on May 21, 2009 11:06 AM EDT up reply actions  

It's an opinion...there is no quantifiable truth to it.

But to say at this point that Ramon Hernandez of the career MLB OPS of .692 is that same guy isn’t exactly true either. He could hit a little at one point, but I think that time has passed.

Obviously, Santos is not the best option in the world there, but I would have taken my chances with him.

by AnthonyR on May 21, 2009 11:43 AM EDT up reply actions  

I'd prefer Santos up there too.

At least he’s been proving he can drive the ball. Even if it is just into an outfielders mitt. The career numbers don’t mean a whole lot to me here since Martinez is a shell of his former self.

- Rivers McCown, From Mom's Basement

by riversmccown on May 21, 2009 6:44 PM EDT up reply actions  

Well you have to keep in mind that manager's are notoriously risk-averse so they don't get blamed for things.

If that game goes to the bottom of the ninth and someone hurts themselves playing out of position, Manuel would’ve been laughed out of town.

Not saying I don’t agree, but there was no way in hell he was pinch-hitting for Martinez there.

- Rivers McCown, From Mom's Basement

by riversmccown on May 21, 2009 6:42 PM EDT up reply actions  

Hopefully he is not to the point where he is scared to make the correct move.

That would make a mediocre manager even worse. He did do a pretty good job though aside and he doesn’t have a lot of options.

Really, it wasn’t a managing decision as much as bad luck. If Reyes didn’t go down, there wouldn’t have been a move to make.

by AnthonyR on May 21, 2009 9:47 PM EDT up reply actions  

Disagree

My Jerry-hatred is well documented here, but I thought he did a great job yesterday. Perfect lineup, good bullpen use. My only quibble would be using Tatis instead of Sheff to PH for Ryan Church, but if Sheff was unavailable, then no problemo. I would’ve liked to keep Tatis, though, because he at least could slide into SS.

by PSUdevon on May 21, 2009 6:38 PM EDT reply actions  

Uhh...

Didn’t I say he did a good job? What exactly are you disagreeing with?

- Rivers McCown, From Mom's Basement

by riversmccown on May 21, 2009 6:41 PM EDT up reply actions  

B- isn't good

he did just about everything right yesterday. I’d give him an A-.

by PSUdevon on May 21, 2009 10:08 PM EDT up reply actions  

To get anywhere near an A

He’d have to have done everything perfectly.

I don’t think so. A great game for him, but that’s never going to be a A.

- Rivers McCown, From Mom's Basement

by riversmccown on May 22, 2009 1:48 AM EDT up reply actions  

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